Is the Caesar really out of style?

Yesterday I ran across a blog post written by Joanna Prisco in the New York Post titled: “Hail Caesar! The tired salad standby gets a fresh new spin at city restaurants.”

Here’s the first three graphs of the post:

As greens go, the Caesar salad hasn’t been the hippest way to eat your veggies in recent years.

After exploding in popularity in the 1980s, it fell out of fashion — and off many restaurant menus — because it was high in fat, contained raw egg and was seen as just plain boring.

“It lost cachet,” says Andrew F. Smith, a New York University food historian and the editor-in-chief of “The Oxford Companion to American Food and Drink,” of the salad, which was reportedly invented by an Italian chef named Caesar Cardini at a Tijuana hotel, circa 1924, when he spontaneously combined romaine lettuce, croutons, lemon and Parmigiano cheese.

Original Joe's Caesar

I found this interesting because the tried-and-true Caesar hasn’t lost any cachet in San Francisco; it’s still the go-to salad on many menus. I had it this week at Rivoli in Berkeley and it’s still one of the must- order items at Zuni Cafe, Slow Club, Cook in St. Helena, Original Joe’s and Spruce (order it with the hamburger).

Pizza and Caesar are a classic duo — the tangy cheese, the umami of anchovy, the creaminess of the eggs and the crunch of the cold lettuce makes it a nearly perfect pairing to a pizza. And, as we know, artisan pizza has become so ubiquitous that it could single-handedly give new to life to a Caesar. The combo is particularly alluring at places like Zero Zero; Gioia, where it’s updated with fried anchovy; Cupola; Pizzeria Piccoin Larkspur; and Tony’s Pizza Napoletana.

The New York Post article went on to talk about other restaurants that are reinventing the genre, such as a Caesar nigiri at Wylie Dufresne’s new gastropub, Alder, scheduled to open next week, and a kale Caesar at Buttermilk Channel in Brooklyn.

Caesar deviled eggs (foreground) at Jasper's. The Chronicle 2011

In the Bay Area the classic is still popular but some restaurants are giving it a twist. In the Tartine Bread cookbook published in 2010, Chad Roberston published his recipe for a kale Caesar, which I’ve had several times this winter. At places like the Trident in Sausalito and Presidio Social Club,the more trendy Little Gem lettuce has replaced the sturdier romaine. Jasper’s Corner Tapserves a deviled egg with a Caesar flavor.

Yet it’s the salad — and dressing — that is part of classic San Francisco. Trendy or not, it’s here to stay. Caesar salad is California comfort food.